Editor:
I want to make a few comments about the 2013 Edmonds budget. First I want to say that Mayor Earling deserves credit for presenting a budget to city council that balances 2013 revenues and expenses. And I must thank finance director Hunstock for producing a first-class budget package. I am particularly pleased that at last we have a budget for the coming year with figures that are compared to up-to-date estimates for the current year, as opposed to comparing to budget figures that were produced one year ago.
I have noticed that wages for 2012 are estimated to be over budget and 5.9 percent above 2011. Perhaps that is a result of the early retirement program, but I have not heard any explanation for that variance.
Speaking about wages, I believe that citizens will be pleased to see the extensive inclusion in the budget of represented, as well as non-represented, employee salary ranges. For full transparency I would like to see this information eventually expanded to include actual salaries for the incumbents.
Achievement of a balanced budget means that it will not be “business as usual” for our city. Citizens should acquaint themselves with the two dozen service level implications that the mayor has listed in his budget memo.
City council does have the ability to restore some of the cuts that cause those service level reductions. The budget projects that at the end of 2013 the general fund will have a balance of $3.9 million in excess of the 16 percent contingency reserve fund. Prudent use of some of that balance is an option – particularly for one-time expenses like the badly needed code rewrite, and as back-up for the risk management reserve fund that could prove to be inadequate to cover the many lawsuits against the city.
Balancing the budget, without service cuts, or tax increases, will be an impossibility as long as city employees receive COLA plus 5 percent step increases every year until they reach the top of their salary range. For 2013 those increases are expected to amount to 7 percent for both union and non-union employees. Where else in this economy, except in other municipalities, are employees getting anywhere near pay increases of 7 percent!
Unfortunately the city does not have many choices, because we need to pay competitive salaries. One solution is to reduce the number of employees as the mayor has proposed. An alternative is to do what FD1 did this year; they successfully sought concessions from the union and thus prevented the layoff of some firefighters.
In my view the longer term solution is to reduce headcount by obtaining efficiencies by amalgamating municipalities; for example we could have one city the size of the Edmonds School District which includes 5 communities. Action like that is unlikely to happen unless it is driven by Olympia. It is time for our state government to act.
There will be public hearings on the budget at the Nov. 5th and the Nov. 20th council meetings; I urge citizens to attend one of those meetings and tell councilmembers what you think about the proposed budget.
Ron Wambolt
Edmonds
Mr. Wambolt makes some very good points. I believe, however, that some clarification is needed. He makes note of raises being 7 percent as if it is an unusual amount. That it is a combination of a COLA and step increase should be more detailed. Even though he does mention that the City does need to be competitive in wages, it appears that the raises are being vilified.
New hires and inexperienced people are started at wages way below the top wage. As their tenure and experience grows, so do their wages via the step increases. The step increases don’t go on forever and once they stop, the only way to get a raise is to get a COLA. So not every employee will get both.
As far as the COLA’s go, they don’t always result in a raise. Because they are tied to the consumer price index, CPI, it may result in no raise. If a contract is written a certain way and the CPI was negative, then you could potentially see wages go down because of it. But, so far, I’ve never seen one written that way. Also, many of the contracts are written with a maximum increase, usually 3%, and if the CPI is 4% or as high as 10%, then the raise is only 3%. I have seen that.
I have also seen the contract written to give raises of only 90% of the CPI. This results in the City offering less competitive wages than other locations. When this happens you see good employees jumping ship to improve their financial situations.
I would like to see Edmonds be economically viable to be able to support itself without raising taxes. With the Highway 99 corridor being restricted and the noose around the bowl area, it won’t happen. People in Edmonds don’t like Kirkland. Well, how about Mill Creek then. The Town Center there seems to be busy all the time with lots of shops. With the antique mall property going to be developed, it would be a perfect time to get some new building codes.
Paul:
I am indeed condemning 7% raises that any government workers receive in the current economic environment. The criterion for government workers getting 5% step increases is simply being on the job one more year. Workers in the private sector also often start at the bottom of their salary range, and they work their way to the top of that salary range by earning merit pay increases. And for many years now, those merit increases have not approached 7%. The vast majority of private sector workers do not receive COLA – only merit increases.
For our city workers not to receive the full CPI is an exception, not the norm. For example, in 2009 the COLA for most workers amounted to 5.8% and 6.2% for Police.
And, of course, I totally agree with the comments in your last paragraph. Our city council needs to authorize building codes that not only protect the good characteristics of our city, but they also need to proceed with a sense of urgency dealing with recommendations from the city’s Planning Board. In June 2011 the Planning Board finalized their recommendations on BD zone changes to the code. There are two elements of those recommendations – step backs and development agreements – that are delaying current redevelopment, but action on them by city council has yet to be finalized. It is noteworthy that there has been no development in the BD zones, that apply to all of our downtown, since the zones were established in early 2006!
In November of 2001 we voted in initiative 747 capping property taxes at 1%.
Since property taxes are our number one scource of income the city has been slowly suffocating for the past 11 years. While we contract for 5 – 6 – 7% pay increases to stay competitive, our own income has been going backwards. When the Mayor says he has no more tricks, gadgets or gimmicks to fix the budget we better pay attention. These cuts now will start hurting. We have been playing three card monty to keep a float. I for one wish I had never heard of inititive 747. We need to increase revenue.
For you folks that want no development and no more taxes please offer some solutions. We are all ready to listen?
Dave – You hit the nail on the head and I agree with your statement 100%.
Mr. Wambolt,
I really have a great deal of appreciation for the way that you respond to things here. Very respectful.
You have me at a disadvantage as I do not know the exact percentages of the step increases. I do know that the Chief of Police has to approve a persons step increase and those increases are based on evaluations. I guess you could call that “on your merit”. Don’t do well and your step increase could, potentially, be delayed. And then, how do you separate step increases from COLA’s when they are awarded.
Another aspect is on the separation of salary amount at the start as opposed to the top wage. If 5% is the step increase amount, to make it smaller do you raise the bottom to have people start at a higher wage, or do you try to reduce the top and bring it closer to the bottom. If you reduce the top, then this will conflict with competitive wage levels in other locations.
If we were to establish merit pay increases for the police, I am quite sure nobody would like the result. For instance, I know that part of an evaluation deals with ticket counts. Do you want an officer’s pay to go up, and by how much, if they write a bunch of tickets? That could result in lots of tickets being written when previously a verbal warning would have been sufficient. Nobody wants to be on the wrong end of that. Merit pay criterion for government workers, in many cases, will be hard to establish. I could make an argument that more connection to evaluations to get a step increase should be instituted. I wouldn’t be too popular with my younger former co-workers, but, I guess it could be developed.
The COLA’s in 2009, I believe weren’t based entirely upon the CPI. I believe that there was an adjustment made at that time to raise the police salaries to the mid range of the comparable cities. When you go several years only getting 90% of the CPI as an increase, you eventually find yourself at the bottom of the wage scale for comparable cities. There is a break-down of that agreement somewhere, I’m sure.